Increasing vehicle traffic in the larger population centers, as well as the increasing need for space, have made it necessary to provide parking places for even more vehicles, while at the same time minimizing the space used. In this connection, above-ground and underground garages are already known, in which vehicles are positioned close to one another on a plurality of parking levels. In this kind of parking garage, it is usual for the vehicles to move under their own power along appropriate ramps and corridors to the individual parking locations.
This kind of parking is, however, subject to various disadvantages. The entry and exit passages require a substantial amount of additional space, so that with a given construction volume, fewer parking spaces can be provided. Further, the vehicle exhaust gases make it necessary to provide extensive ventilation systems which greatly increase the cost of the parking facility and, in addition, require even more space. Moreover, this kind of installation must be publicly accessible, which on the one hand can endanger the parked automobiles in the sense of being stolen or damaged, and on the other hand can endanger individuals.
For these reasons, various proposals have been made in the past for the construction of mechanized, automatic parking garages, in which the vehicles are left by their owners in an entrance, are loaded onto a lift platform by a special apparatus, are conveyed to the entry of one of a plurality of parking compartments with the help of the lift platform, and finally are deposited within the corresponding parking compartment. In this connection, a particularly simple construction involves a circular arrangement with outwardly lying parking compartments and a central lift apparatus.
In U.S. Pat. No. 5,478,182, there is a discussion of several different automatic parking garages. For the sake of convenience, this discussion is substantially repeated below.
In Swiss Patent specification CH-A5-649 340, there is disclosed an automatic parking garage having:
(a) a storage silo with a circular periphery, which storage silo encloses a cylindrical inner shaft and includes, on a plurality of stacked parking levels, a plurality of radially directed parking compartments open toward the inner shaft; and PA1 (b) a conveying apparatus located in the inner shaft for the transportation of vehicles between at least one entrance and the parking compartments, or between the parking compartments and at least one exit, the conveying apparatus including a plurality of vehicle-receiving transport surfaces which are movable in a vertical direction and can be rotated together in a horizontal direction about a central axis, such that they can be positioned through vertical movement at the level of one of the parking levels or at the level of the at least one entrance, or the at least one exit, and then, through rotation about the central axis, can be brought adjacent to one of the parking compartments in the corresponding parking level.
In the parking garage described immediately above, a plurality of parking compartments or single parking spaces are arranged in different parking levels radially about a cylindrical shaft. In the shaft is provided an elevator apparatus with a rotatable lift platform which defines two rotatable spaces for receiving vehicles. By vertical movement and/or rotation of the platform about a central axis, all parking compartments can be reached by the rotatable spaces.
The two rotatable spaces are provided parallel with one another at opposite sides of the central axis, and have their longitudinal axes displaced away from one another, so that their longitudinal axes are substantially out of alignment with the radial direction. The parking compartments of each parking level are correspondingly angled to each other, so that their longitudinal axes can be brought into alignment with the longitudinal axes of the rotatable spaces. The parking spaces of each level are divided into two equal halves, such that each of the halves can be directed only to one of the rotatable spaces, because of the different angulation.
On the one hand, because of the special arrangement of the parking compartments, the construction of the parking garage is relatively expensive. On the other hand, the deposit of the vehicles is relatively slow, because only two rotatable spaces are available, and only one rotatable space is available for half of the parking compartments of one level.
A further automatic parking garage is known from the German publication DE-A 1-38 31 463. In this parking garage, the parking compartments are arranged radially. For the distribution of the vehicles there is likewise provided a combined lift and rotating apparatus, which, however, provides only a single transport space. The loading and unloading of the transport lift is assisted by an accessory car on which is placed the vehicle to be parked. Since the transport lift can only accept one vehicle, this type of parking garage cannot perform a rapid in and out parking cycle. The use of accessory cars, moreover, makes special apparatus necessary for introducing the car into all parking compartments, requiring a considerable technical expenditure.
Special transfer apparatus for the transportation of vehicles between lift and parking compartment are furthermore known from publications WO91/18162 and EP-A1-0 395 601. In the first of these two publications, a transfer apparatus is proposed which is mechanically very expensive, and especially susceptible to breakdown, this transfer apparatus requiring several levels which are displaceable with respect to each other and have comb-like ends which, upon depositing the vehicle in the parking compartment, inter-engage with corresponding comb-like configurations in the bottom of the compartment.
In the second of these two publications, a transfer apparatus is disclosed which travels sideways with respect to the vehicle and utilizes one of the forward wheels to pull the vehicle into the lift and to push the vehicle into a parking compartment. Because of the external position of the transfer apparatus, additional room is required. Moreover, this transfer apparatus grips only one side of the vehicle, which leads to an unbalanced loading of the chassis.
In U.S. Pat. No. 5,478,182, there is disclosed an automatic parking garage in which the individual parking compartments on the parking levels and the lift mechanism are positioned in a precise radial direction. In the lift, several transport surfaces, preferably four, are provided for the vehicles. The individual parking compartments can be accessed by all transport surfaces in the same manner, since the construction has a high degree of symmetry, and all compartments are equivalent to each other. Finally, the connection between a transport surface and a parking compartment is particularly simple, because the facing edges are very closely spaced due to the radial configuration.
The transport surfaces can be moved in various ways. In accordance with a first preferred embodiment of the invention, the transport surfaces are provided on a common transport platform, and are displaced together vertically by a vertical movement, and are rotated together by rotation of the transport platform.
According to a second preferred embodiment, the transport surfaces are vertically displaceable independently of one another by means of individual lifts, wherein the individual lifts are provided on a common rotary table which rotates about the central axis.
A further preferred embodiment of the invention is characterized in that a pulling apparatus operating in a radial direction is provided on each of the transport surfaces, for pulling a vehicle out of an entrance or out of a parking compartment onto the transport surface, and for pushing a vehicle from the transport surface into an exit or into a parking compartment. The pulling apparatus moves the vehicle being parked by using the wheels of the vehicle.
The apparatus of the aforementioned '182 patent utilizes a pushing and pulling apparatus comprising a sliding carriage movable radially of the transport surfaces along a radial guide rail. The carriage includes a pair of arms having rollers thereon adapted to engage the front wheels of a vehicle and to pull the vehicle by its front wheels out of the parking compartment or entrance and onto the adjacent transport surface. During the reverse process of expelling the vehicle, the sliding carriage pushes the vehicle by its front wheels.
Inasmuch as many vehicle owners prefer to leave their car in "park" and locked, it is deemed preferable to provide a transfer apparatus for moving vehicles onto, and off of, transport surfaces without the need to require rolling of the wheels of the vehicle.
Further, the apparatus of the '182 patent requires rotational movement of each transport surface having a vehicle thereon to align the vehicle with a selected parking compartment. Rotational movement of one transport surface requires rotational movement of the entire carousel, thereby generally mandating moving only one vehicle at a time into a parking compartment.
It is deemed preferable to have the facility of moving a plurality of vehicles into parking compartments at substantially the same time.